Cabin Fever Tales
by Atolm2000
Summary: SO3 Space:Hours and hours of nothing and nothing, interspersed with minutes of screaming panic...These are the tales of what happens when a crew of nuts like these are stuck in the hours and hours of nothing part.
1. Albel's war

If there was one thing there was too much of in space, it was time. A "high-speed" warp-space pursuit could mean days; a short hop between stars, a week. The time is what makes spacers and those who make their living in the starlanes crazy; hours upon days upon weeks, with the same group of people, in the same small enclosed ship, with no escape.

These are the tales of the starship Diplo, in the endless time between places you never heard about.

8

It wasn't that Feit or Cliff were good at chess that'd gotten a few others in the small lounge idly watching; if anything it was more the opposite, as the game held the fascination of a train wreck. Maybe the few other crew were just watching for lack of anything better to do.

"Check."

"You sure you want to move there?"

Feit raised an eyebrow. "...yeah..."

"Absolutely sure?"

"...Why wouldn't I be? It's check."

"...Just making sure, since yanno, that might be just what I needed..."

"...whatever. Check."

Cliff mulled over the three pieces he had left, to Feit's four. Most of them were halfway across the board. And unfortunately, there was no way to get a pawn to move backwards. "Hey, over there!" had only worked once, and had gotten a dustball-squabble. If he could just get some kind of diversion, that would sufficiently distract Feit, he might be able to just move the piece and maybe Feit wouldn't notice...

The doors opened.

"Thought I'd forgotten our score to settle, did you?"

In the half-second recognition that the Crimson Scourge was levelled at the game, Cliff decided that Albel in one of his violent moods was probably overkill as distractions went, while it was true that Feit had forgotten the game in favor of realizing exactly how far across the ship he was from any weapon.

Albel dove to the attack. Cliff and Feit dove to get out of the way. The rest of the crew dove for the nearest cover. The battle was over in a matter of minutes, and the Elicoorian stalked out smug, leaving his target in pieces on the floor.

It was almost five minutes of dumbfounded silence while the others in the room processed what'd just happened. The chess board was salvageable, the pieces intact, but the table had passed on to the great beyond, hacked to a hundred little metal slivers.

Feit regained his wits and his feet, going straight to the door; but "WHAT DID THE TABLE EVER DO TO YOU!" only got cackling in response.


	2. In space noone can hear you spazz

...You know, as I get more of these written down I'm almost going to feel sorry for Cliff XD

And I honestly did next expect the spellcheck to allow "conspiratorially" O.o

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Cliff was on his second hour of playing cards against the computer when he heard a quiet giggle off on the other side of the room. He tried to ignore Maria but then in the whispering he heard Mirage and was beginning to get the distinct feeling of eyes on his back.

The whispering and occasional snerks and giggles continued; he stretched, mostly as a cover to nonchalantly glance over his shoulder and confirm that yes, the two girls were watching him far too intently, leaned over the table whispering conspiratorially.

It wasn't stopping either, which worried him. Them plotting never boded well; he'd been roped into rigged bets, ridiculous dares, and fifteen varieties of snipe hunt, not even counting the times Mirage used him for a practice-target for booby-traps. He tried to focus on his game and ignore them; if he said anything, he'd only be giving them an opening.

Then it sounded closer. He glanced over one shoulder; they had moved to a couch a few feet closer to him, still eyeing him and whispering back and forth. Various random traumas flickered through his mind - testing some random crewmember's inventions, "walk down this hallway" ending in falling through the floor as it suddenly retracted, several hours spent chasing a "rabid whomp rat"...he hunched his shoulders over the console and tried harder to tune them out.

Then it sounded...too close - and when he looked up, each one was standing behind one side of the chair, leaning on the back of it lazily and smiling at him.

"GYAH!!" Cliff jumped to his feet, pointing an accusing finger at both of them, the nervous eyetwitch visible. "Ha! I bet you think you're going to get me again eh? I'm on to you two this time and you're not getting away with anything! You'll never take me alive!", and with that, he dashed out of the room.

"Hmm..New record. He didn't even wait for us to say hi that time before he started yelling."

Maria nodded, noting it down on a scorecard on a PDA computer.

"So which of us gets that point?"


End file.
